Their morning flights changed after Harry's confession. The silence between them grew softer, less brittle. Sometimes they still raced after the Snitch, but more often they found themselves hovering in the quiet dawn, sharing pieces of themselves they couldn't voice on solid ground.

Ginny noticed the small changes first – how Harry no longer flinched when their hands brushed passing the toast at breakfast, the way his smile came a little easier when their eyes met across the crowded kitchen. He'd started joining her on the porch steps in the evenings, not quite touching but close enough that she could feel the warmth of him in the cooling air.

It wasn't perfect. There were still mornings when she'd find him already in the air, flying too high and too fast, trying to outrace whatever nightmare had driven him from sleep. But now, instead of watching helplessly from below, she'd mount her broom and follow. Sometimes they'd talk about it – quiet words carried away by the wind. Sometimes they'd just fly together until his breathing steadied and the sun rose to chase away the shadows.

"I think about the Chamber sometimes," she told him one morning, surprising herself. They were sitting on their brooms high above the orchard, sharing an apple she'd snagged from the kitchen. "Not just the big moments – Tom possessing me, you fighting the basilisk. I think about the little things. How cold I was all that year, like I'd never be warm again. How sometimes I'd wake up and not know if I was really awake or if he was just making me think I was."

Harry's hand found hers in the space between their brooms. "Do you still feel that way? Like you're not sure what's real?"

"Sometimes," she admitted. "But then I feel this—" she squeezed his fingers "—and I know Tom never could have imagined this. He didn't understand enough about love to fake it properly."

The look Harry gave her then made her heart stutter. It was the same blazing look from before the war, but deeper somehow. More earned.

They were different now, both of them. She wasn't the girl who'd waited faithfully while he went off to save the world. He wasn't the boy who'd pushed her away to protect her. They'd both learned the hard way that safety was an illusion, that love wasn't about protection but about choosing each other anyway, broken pieces and all.

The change was most noticeable in the quiet moments – Harry absentmindedly running his fingers through her hair while she read by the fire, Ginny knowing exactly when to press a cup of tea into his hands after a particularly rough night. They moved around each other with an ease that made her mother smile and her brother pretend not to notice.

Which was why Ginny immediately tensed when she came downstairs one morning to find Harry sitting stiffly at the kitchen table, an official-looking letter clutched in his hand. Her mother was hovering nearby, clearly bursting to say something but holding herself back.

"What is it?" Ginny asked, though she already knew it had to be important. Harry had missed their morning flight for this.

"Minister Shacklebolt is coming," Harry said, his voice carefully neutral. "He wants to discuss... my future."

Ginny's heart did something complicated in her chest. She knew what this was about – the Auror program had been trying to recruit Harry since the battle. But this was different. This was official.

"When?"

"This afternoon." Harry finally looked up at her, and the conflict in his eyes made her want to hex whoever had put it there. "Ginny, I—"

The crack of Apparition from the garden cut him off. Through the window, Ginny could see Kingsley Shacklebolt's tall figure striding toward the house, his purple robes standing out against the morning mist.

"That's not afternoon," she muttered, watching Harry straighten his shoulders like he was preparing for battle. Before she could say anything else, her mother was hurrying to open the door, all aflutter at having the Minister of Magic in her kitchen.

"Harry," Kingsley's deep voice filled the room. "Thank you for agreeing to meet with me." His eyes flickered briefly to Ginny, and something in his expression softened. "Perhaps we could speak privately?"

Harry stood, but his hand found Ginny's before she could step away. "Anything you have to say to me, you can say in front of Ginny."

The conviction in his voice made her chest tight. A month ago, he would have retreated into himself, shouldered this new weight alone. Now he was choosing to let her stay, to face whatever came next together.

Kingsley nodded, seemingly unsurprised. "Very well. Harry, as you know, we're rebuilding the Auror Department. After everything that happened during the war, we need people we can trust. People with real experience fighting Dark magic." He paused, his gaze steady. "We're starting a new training program in the fall. Fast-tracked for those who fought in the Battle of Hogwarts. And we want you to lead it."

Harry's grip on Ginny's hand tightened, but his voice remained steady. "Lead it?"

"You've already done more than most fully trained Aurors," Kingsley said. "Your experience, your natural abilities... And people trust you, Harry. They'll follow you."

There it was – the weight of expectations settling back onto Harry's shoulders. Ginny could feel the tension radiating from him, could almost hear the thoughts racing through his mind. This was everything he'd once wanted. A chance to keep fighting, to protect people, to make a difference.

But he wasn't the same person who'd dreamed of being an Auror in Umbridge's office. That boy hadn't died and come back. Hadn't spent a year carrying a piece of Voldemort's soul. Hadn't finally found a way to live without a prophecy hanging over his head.

"I'll need time to think about it," Harry said finally.

"Of course." Kingsley stood. "But Harry... we need your answer by the end of the week. The program starts in September, and there's much to prepare."

After the Minister left, Harry remained at the table, staring at his hands. Ginny waited, knowing he needed to find the words himself.

"Everyone will expect me to say yes," he said finally, so quietly she almost missed it.

Ginny thought about the boy who'd confessed his emptiness to her in the dawn sky, who was slowly learning to fill that space with something of his own choosing. She thought about expectations and prophecies and the weight of other people's needs.

"Then maybe," she said carefully, "that's exactly why you need to really think about it."

Harry looked up at her, and in his eyes she saw the same truth that had been growing between them these past weeks: whatever he decided, he wouldn't be facing it alone.